By Loren K. Baynes, Director, Global Marketing Communications, The Open Group
On Monday, April 25th, The Open Group London 2016 kicked off with an opening speech from The Open Group President and CEO Steve Nunn to a packed room at the Central Hall Westminster. The magnificent venue is just a stone’s throw from the iconic Westminster Abbey. Almost 300 guests from 27 countries around the globe have joined this exciting, informative event.
After a warm welcome and a recap of the successes of The Open Group IT4IT™ Forum to date – including the launch of the Standard and Management Guide – Steve went on to announce the launch of the IT4IT™ Certification Program.
The IT4IT Foundation Certification is now available to individuals who demonstrate knowledge and understanding of the IT4IT™ Reference Architecture, Version 2.0 standard. The first level of certification being launched provides validation that the candidate has gained knowledge of the terminology, structure, basic concepts, and understands the core principles of the IT4IT Reference Architecture and the IT Value Chain.
Monday’s plenary sessions continued the focus on IT4IT, beginning with a presentation from Tony Price, Director, WW IT4IT Strategic Consulting, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, and Erik van Busschbach, World-Wide Chief Technologist for IT Management, HPE Software Services CTO Office, Hewlett Packard Enterprise. Erik and Tony explained how organizations can use IT4IT to move away from talking about Architecture towards discussions around business value. Every audience wants value but they all perceive this value in different ways. Tony explained the importance of contextualizing value to individuals in order for it to be effective.
Erik van Busschbach, Tony Price, Steve Nunn
The IT4IT discussion also featured a joint presentation on ‘Managing the Business of IT’ from Michael Fulton, Principal Architect, CC&C Solutions; David Hornford, Managing Partner, Conexiam; Luke Bradley, Principle Architect, Technology Shared Services Centre, Vodafone Group; David Gilmour, Director, Panastra Pte Ltd, Singapore.
The speakers went into detail about the impact IT4IT can have on an organization. Mike Fulton started with the basics of IT4IT and the Value Chain model, before going on to discuss where IT4IT fits into TOGAF®, an Open Group standard, COBIT and Agile. Luke Bradley provided insight into how IT4IT was being used at Vodafone Group, where there are four main areas of transformation – process, service model, organization, and technology. The importance of getting away from bulk renewal projects and moving towards smaller sensible building blocks was stressed by David Gilmour, who also explained how IT4IT was a “jolly good thing” for business, which raised a smile in the packed-out room.
Gunnar Menzel, Vice President & Chief Architect Officer, Capgemini, came to the stage proudly displaying his medal from the London Marathon from the day before the event – many congratulations to him for a fantastic time of 03:52:15! His presentation focused on how IT4IT can help with Agile DevOps. Businesses that realize DevOps’ full potential are more agile in providing new products and services and can deliver superior quality, but enterprises often encounter difficulties due to the growing number of product choices, definitions and services.
Gunnar directed delegates to The Open Group whitepaper, ‘IT4IT™ Agile Scenario’, which was released in February 2016 and includes a DevOps definition, DevOps Maturity Model as well as a DevOps Implementation framework.
The final session before Monday’s break for lunch came from Henry Franken, CEO at BiZZdesign and chair of The ArchiMate® Forum at The Open Group. Henry presented the results of a survey looking at business transformation, noting that a “business as usual” approach is preventing effective business transformation, along with a lack of strategic design insights and a lack of organizational commitment. He explained how businesses should be taking small steps to embrace change, collaborate on change and make sure to utilize techniques to digitize change capabilities.
The afternoon saw additional tracks taking place on IT4IT, Security and Enterprise Architecture, including:
- Trusted and Secure OpenStack Cloud, Shawn Mullen, Cloud Security Architect, IBM, US
- Seven Reasons IT4IT™ is Good News for Architects, Daniel Warfield, Senior Enterprise Architect, CC&C Americas
- A Future for Enterprise Architecture, Len Fehskens, Chief Editor, Association of Enterprise Architects
- Mils Initiatives: Emerging Open Group Standards for Modular Approach to Critical Systems, Rance DeLong, Staff Scientist – EC Projects, The Open Group
Sally Long, Director of The Open Group Trusted Technology Forum (OTTF), also presented on OTTF in a session which focused on cybersecurity and supply chain risks, how the standard and the accreditation can address them, and what steps organizations can take to assure products are more secure and enterprises stay safe. The presentation was a recap of a recently recorded webinar which can be found here.
Robert Wiesman, CEO at Build the Vision Inc., took the opportunity to discuss his use of EA as a business technique to conduct Architecture-based planning for a huge business transformation.
After a full day of sessions, the first day of the London event concluded with drinks and networking at the Central Hall Westminster.
@theopengroup #ogLON
Loren K. Baynes, Director, Global Marketing Communications, joined The Open Group in 2013 and spearheads corporate marketing initiatives, primarily the website, blog, media relations and social media. Loren has over 20 years experience in brand marketing and public relations and, prior to The Open Group, was with The Walt Disney Company for over 10 years. Loren holds a Bachelor of Business Administration from Texas A&M University. She is based in the US.